Hopping on Stilts, England, 1938

Hops only grow well in certain latitudes and are therefore only produced in a few regions of the world. Hop cultivation for use in beer seems to have begun in central Europe, specifically in the regions that are now Germany and the Czech Republic in the last quarter of the first millennium CE. Northern Europe and England caught on next and eventually parts of the English colonial empire. These days major hop growing regions exist in Germany, The Czech Republic, England (especially Kent), the Pacific Northwest of the United States, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.

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Original source for text and image: Associated Press Photo, 10/10/1938

Stilts are more than a stunt in the Kentish hop fields in England during the annual fall hop harvest. They're necessary to gather the crop which grows along high wires.

Image: Hops, The circulating collection of the Print and Picture Collection, Free Library of Philadelphia